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Wednesday, August 6, 2014

The Prejudice Against Genre Fiction

“You eat what you
like, and I'll eat what I like!”—Yukon Cornelius

Genre is a four letter
word in some literary circles. It's tossed about with
derision. Those works unfortunate enough to fall under the label are
condemned as inferior, the playthings of lesser minds and lower
sensibility. Not such a grave sentence, maybe. Some of us are not
the least ashamed to relieve the burden of our sensibility by
dragging them along in a sack. But the word is tragically misapplied
when used this way.

In the first place, everything
is a genre. “Genre” is simply any collection of works that
share enough of a family resemblance for them to be reasonably
grouped together.

For instance, stories with a central
character who navigates challenges, gains allies, learns skills, and
acquires knowledge on the way to overcoming a final obstacle are a
genre. We refer to them as Fantasy, especially if they trade in
magic and archaic landscapes. But contemplative, closely
interpersonal stories guided largely by themes rather than action or
plot that line the Literature shelves are a genre as well.
Maybe you couldn't pick them out straight away by their covers, but
that does not somehow set them apart.

But literary fiction is broader than
that, they say. You
can't just wrap it up in one so-called genre, that's what makes it
exciting. Yes, the Literature
section can have a great deal of variety, notably because it so often
robs the nests of other genres. Magical Realism, Science Fiction,
Fantasy, Mystery; Literature drops down with its heavy talons and
plucks its choice from each. What is The Road (2007 Pulitzer prize
winner) but a sci-fi horror—the struggle for survival in a burned
out world where cannibals and blood cultists are the only visible
survivors.

So when anyone snidely says “genre,”
what they really mean is “those other genres.” Those few genre
books that enjoy an elevated literary status are the exceptions. But
this sort of thinking begs the question while ignoring its own
conclusion. There is not one kind of fantasy novel, just as
there is not one kind of literary novel—clearly, or there would be
no fantasy novels in the Literature section.

Yes, there are plenty of cliché, one
dimensional fantasy novels. Go to the appropriate aisle in your
bookstore, pull a book off the shelf at random, and there's a good
chance you'll have selected one of these books. They're popcorn
fiction. One piece tastes like the other, and after you've had a
handful you probably can't remember much about any of them, or which
was which. But the same can be said of books shelved in the
Literature section. Slow, run-of-the-mill, “my mundane/tragic life
makes it hard to be happy” novels are published every year—books
that try very hard to be big serious stories, and throwing their
weight around, fall all over themselves and land in a heap.

If our literary regents bent their
astounding linguistic potential to the task for a moment they might
say “plot fiction” is the real offender. But since when is there
anything wrong with a story that's headed somewhere? Where
the story goes and how it gets there is only part of the thrill, though. A
good plot is a mode of conveyance, and there are all sorts. Bullet
trains cover more ground than roller skates; maybe one is more direct
than the other, and the scenery goes by faster, but it's who's inside
them that makes all the difference.

I suppose there is little sense trying
to talk the literary faithful out of their prejudice, sad though it
is to see. But they like what they like, and only what they like,
and if you like something else, you simply have poor taste. For my
part, there are too many fantastic novels across every genre to think
of excluding any of them from consideration. And anyway, who the hell doesn't
like popcorn now and then?

1 comment:

"Literary" fiction is like classical music -- establishment, passive, pedantic group-think; "genre" fiction is like folk and pop music. The 'literati" need to get over it and stop being M-F-A snobs. Typically, "literary" doesn't make it better, just boring. IMHO. Mind you, there are notable exceptions.